Great Lakes Water Levels

Picture from Jack Martin, enjoying the Sleeping Bear Dunes. Lake Michigan/Huron gained another inch last week, bringing it even closer to the long-term average. The other Great Lakes remain above their long-term averages.

Lake Michigan/Huron (one big lake for lake level purposes) is up 4″ in the last month and is up a whopping 15″ in the last year. Since each inch of water represents 390 billion gallons, that means Lake Michigan has added 5.85 trillion gallons of water in just the past year. This is due to a combination of above average precipitation (Grand Rapids has had 9.47″ of rain since June 1, 3.65″ above average) and lower evaporation (lots of ice this past winter). Lake Michigan/Huron is now only 4″ below the long-term average. Lake Superior is up 2″ in the last month and up 14″ in the last year. Superior is now 6″ above the century average and only 6″ below the highest water level ever reached in 1950. Lake Erie is up 1″ in the last month and up 3″ in the past year. Erie is 5″ above the long-term average. Lake Ontario is 4″ above the century average. Lake St. Clair is up 2″ in the last month, up 7″ year-to-year and 3″ above the century average level. Lake Superior’s outflow down the St. Mary’s River into Lake Huron is expected to be above average into August. The outflow our of Lake Erie down the Niagara River is also expected to be above average.

27 Responses to “Great Lakes Water Levels”

As for weather, this weekend into next week looks fantastic by my standards. Highs in the 80′s and lows in the low to mid 60′s. That is perfect! We do not need the 90′s around here as I know that gets very hot, but if we do I won’t complain.

As for the upcoming winter, I sure hope its relatively mild in terms of temperatures. We no NOT

Easy , easy on the up – coming winter speak…..lol. Hey we just started summer Kyle , don’t mention the ” W ” word yet as we still have 1 and 3/4 of a season to go , or at least wait till fall comes , as you gave me the chills , besides Rocky has that base completely covered already.

Yes , I am starting to get that SVR weather itch again but I’m not seeing much on the horizon but possibly a dust up next week. The models seem to be a bit conflicted attm ( especially with the smaller scale features ) but the ECMWF seems to be getting the majority of the weight . So we shall see with the warmer flow and moisture aloft and the possibility of a cold front pushing through if we can indeed fire up some of that good old convection.

Interesting vid , as I agree it does look some what like a shark but then again parts of it don’t . I haven’t seen that shark species if it indeed is a shark( very hard to tell form the vid ) and it doesn’t look like a bull shark to me. Interesting non the less.

I googled it last night, and all things point to a hoax. I personally don’t think they could survive in freshwater that long. Especially in those water temps. They would’ve had to travel an incredible distance just to get there. Might make for a good movie down the road maybe.

Looks like the warmup starts again in a few days (still below average tomorrow). While we have been in a cool pattern for a couple weeks (much of June was above average and May was the warmest May ever across the world), the American North West has been incredible warm and suffering in the heat. I am very happy that summer is finally almost a month in and that fall is just around the corner. Cant wait for the leaves to change